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Eminent artists have raised their voices in protest against what they call an “capricious restructuring” of the nation’s museum landscape, as the Flanders government seek to cut public spending by dismantling the operations of the country’s most historic modern art institution and relocating its complete holdings to another city.

Directors Decry ‘Flagrant Illegalities’ in Museum Overhaul

At a Tuesday briefing in Antwerp, the leadership of the city’s Museum of Contemporary Art (M HKA), founded in 1985, decried what they termed the “blatant violations” of the museum sector shake-up, a plan scheduled for discussed in Belgium’s parliament on Friday.

“Antwerp represents Flanders’ biggest city, with a heritage as a home of the avant-garde in Belgium,” said Luc Tuymans, an Antwerp resident painter widely seen as Belgium’s most influential living artist.

“To demote a museum to an exhibition space is utterly irrational. You cannot simply move a collection of artworks and transfer it into another ecosystem, because that specific context is not present,” he added.

Surprise Move Cancels New Building, Relocates Holdings

In October, the culture minister of the Flemish government scrapped the proposed development of a new, purpose-built €80m tower to house the institution, and revealed intentions to move its holdings of approximately 8,000 artworks to Ghent’s Municipal Museum of Contemporary Art (Smak). This unexpected decision will in effect strip the Antwerp institution of its museum status.

The M HKA’s holdings also includes works by international artists such as Kerry James Marshall, Anish Kapoor and Marina Abramović.

“I do not accept that they could be taken away from M HKA or otherwise put at risk as part of any institutional reorganisation,” stated artist Anish Kapoor in a message to the culture ministry.

Financial Constraints Drive Austerity in Cultural Field

Belgium faces a budget deficit of 5.4 percent of its economic output, one of the largest in the eurozone. The cultural domain specifically is facing dramatic cuts, with budget-tightening policies also implying an unclear fate for the new Brussels Kanal museum.

According to the plans of Flanders’ socialist culture minister, the museum landscape would be streamlined so that cultural holdings in the Flanders region are housed within three flagship institutions for historical, modern and contemporary art.

The region boasts a multitude of contemporary art museums: in addition to M HKA in Antwerp and Smak in Ghent, there is Musea Brugge in Bruges and Museum M in Leuven.

Financial Inspectorate Questions Savings Logic

Whether the proposed shake-up would truly reduce expenses has been questioned by the national audit office. In a memorandum addressed to the minister in October, it issued a negative assessment on the proposals, suggesting their effect on the budget would be “partial and incomplete”.

While moving the museum’s permanent collection could reduce operating costs from approximately €8m to €5m, it is understood that going forward the Antwerp institution would have to spend money to loan artworks or buy in exhibitions to draw audiences.

Ghent’s Smak, located about an hour by train from the M HKA, is also thought to currently not have sufficient room to adequately store M HKA’s holdings, and would need investment to expand its storage capacity.